


loving you (is the easiest thing)

by echoesofstardust



Series: how many ways can i love you? [2]
Category: Figure Skating RPF
Genre: And did I say FLUFF?, F/M, Fluff, Love Letters, More Fluff, lazy early mornings (with a smidgen of smut)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-11
Updated: 2019-10-11
Packaged: 2020-12-09 03:37:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20988194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/echoesofstardust/pseuds/echoesofstardust
Summary: Scott finds the letter that Tessa wrote to him.





	loving you (is the easiest thing)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [imaginedandreal](https://archiveofourown.org/users/imaginedandreal/gifts).

> Dear imaginedandreal,
> 
> Happy birthday! I hope you like my humble gift. It doesn't measure up to your loveliness but I hope it can bring you some measure of joy. You're the first person that I told of my plan to write a follow-up to my fic 'loving you (is the only thing I know how to do)' and I thought it fitting that I'd write it for you <3
> 
> If there's anyone else out there willing to indulge in this fluffiness (I would apologise for the amount of cuddling...but I won't), hope you enjoy!

Here’s the thing about Scott Moir: he knows he’s a damn lucky man.

There must’ve been some incredibly good thing he did in a previous life, because to be able to love Tessa Virtue—and to be loved by her in return—is an indescribable gift.

He’s usually the first to wake up between the two of them, and he loves to take that moment to study her. Tessa awake is a force to be reckoned with, capable of absolutely anything she puts her mind to, but Tessa asleep is beautiful in her own way. He's in awe that she trusts him to be with her in this way, to be the closest when she's the most vulnerable.

She's a study in contrasts. The darkness of her hair against the paleness of her skin. The softness of her curves against the planes of her muscles. 

He props himself up on one elbow, and she shifts slightly in the way she's slotted against him. She makes the softest whimper, still mostly asleep, curling her body close until she's nestled against him again. She sighs the softest of sighs, pure contentment in that single sound. 

His heart swells a million sizes. If this is love, to sweetly ache, to know how much power they hold because they hold your heart and your hand but you trust them to do all in their power to take care of you, then it is everything. 

She starts to stir, a sign that she's waking up. She stretches languidly, eyes blinking open slowly because it's Tessa and mornings have never been her best friend. 

(She had whispered to him once that she doesn't mind mornings as much now that she can wake up to him, to his smile, his eyes, his hands. 

His heart. 

She had said it in the way that little kids whisper secrets at sleepovers and he understands. Tessa had always guarded her heart, not out of a lack of love but because of an overflowing of it, and don't treasure chests guard with lock and key because of the precious things inside them? To hear her tell him that, trembling yet trusting, looking into his eyes even though he knows that it's easier to say what you're scared to say if you avert your gaze, is more precious than any rare stone or metal.)

Sunlight falls on her bare shoulders, the sheets slipping because of her movements. All those love songs that sing about waking up next to the person you love is captured in exactly one shade of green. 

Hers.

"Morning," she says, her voice still a little rough from sleep. Her lips curve into the sweetest of smiles, a hand tucked under her cheek as she looks at him. 

"Morning," he says back just as easily. He can't resist whispering his fingertips from her jaw to her temple to her hair. 

"How long have you been creepily staring at me for?" she teases, even as she closes her eyes in bliss at his touch. 

He laughs. He's been caught, but hasn't she already captured every single piece of him since that very first day? 

"Guilty as charged," he murmurs and she grins.

She lays her hand on his that's still tracing nonsensical shapes on her skin, connecting her freckles like constellations. She threads her fingers through his, tugging his hand across and he follows her wordless command until he's hovering over her. 

He takes that opportunity to seek out the places on her neck that he knows are the most ticklish, and he's rewarded by bursts of giggles that fall from her lips, light and sweet as spring rain. He's a cartographer of her body, thoroughly mapping every inch and no matter how much he knows, he still seeks to discover more. 

He likes knowing where places that make her laugh are, and likes just as much that shifting his lips an inch from said places will instead elicit a moan. 

He's mapped those places too.

"Scott," Tessa whimpers after he's taken his time slowly letting his mouth and hands wander through every landmark on his journey to undo her. Her hand fists in his hair, her body strung tight.

He scoots further down, taking the tangled bedsheets down with him, slowly baring her to his gaze. He doesn't think he can ever tire of looking at her. If anyone ever asks him what his favourite part of her is, he wouldn't know what to answer. 

Her eyes, the shade of gorgeous green that see him as he is with all his strengths and his weaknesses, and she still chooses to be with him. 

Her lips, that smile in ways both sinful and sweet. 

Her hands, that she's given for him to hold and that have held him up when he's at his lowest. 

Her legs, which have felt the most excruciating pain, which bear the scars of all her sacrifices that she made for the two of them, that are incredibly strong, just like the woman they belong to. 

Her neck, which is like the safest place for him to rest his head, where it always feels like home. 

Her mind, because she's so fucking smart and knows so much, determined and driven in a way that mere mortals can only dream about. 

Her heart, that beats everyday and he's thankful that it always does because it means she's still on this Earth; that he still gets to see her, hear her, feel her and be with her. If there's one wish fate could grant him it'd be that he has to be the first to leave this life because he doesn't think he could live without Tessa. Her heart that loves him.

His favourite part of Tessa is—Tessa, her whole person, with all her mistakes and triumphs and every single everyday, mundane moment he gets to share with her. 

He peppers kisses down her stomach, the muscles of her abs tensing, his hands gliding up the outside of her legs. His palms shift their trajectory so that his thumbs sweep the sensitive skin of her inner thighs. Up, and up, and up. Where she’s wet and aching and wanting.

“Scott,” this time his name sounds more like a desperate and broken moan, instantly making him half-hard, and it’s his homing call to where she wants him most. He loves learning what she likes, what brings her to the edge the quickest and the sounds she makes when he takes his time, the exact combination of pressure and rhythm from his fingers and lips and tongue that will make her come.

He’s an explorer with exactly one destination and he’s not going to stop until he brings her there. She tightens her grip on his hair, her thighs tensing around his shoulders, and she says his name again as she comes, closer to a cry and breaking his name into multiple syllables. 

“Hi,” he props his chin on her stomach, watches the way her cheeks are flushed, her lips curved in the way that tells him she can’t stop how wide she’s smiling.

She tries to say something but she doesn’t, her chest still heaving. He’s pretty proud of rending her speechless. Tessa’s a woman who deserves to be adored.

He adores mornings like this because he gets to adore her.

-

He doesn't mean to find it. 

He had looked into the top drawer of the bedside table that's on his side of Tessa's bed (He's still giddy whenever he has that thought--that he has side on her bed, she has a side on his, and maybe one day they'll have their respective sides on a bed that's both theirs.) He’d thought he'd left his spare phone charger there. 

It's not what he finds.

What he finds, instead, is a small notepad. The top page is filled with Tessa's handwriting. The first words he reads are 'Dear Scott'. 

He slams the drawer shut. The noise echoes in the silent room. It's a letter to him, but he feels like he's opened something that was meant to be a secret. 

He's oddly nervous. For a moment, the errant thought crosses his mind that it's a break-up letter. He takes a deep breath. He believes it's not that. Those are his insecurities talking. He's learning to listen more to the sound of Tessa's voice when she tells him she loves him, to the sound of his own heart that's wholly certain in its love for Tess, instead of the ones that used to whisper he'd never be good enough for her. 

And yet, he wonders what the letter could be about. 

He wonders if the best course of action is just to pretend he hasn't seen anything, go about his day like there isn't this burning curiosity inside of him wanting to know what words she wrote for him. 

Except he knows there's no way he's capable of subtlety. Tessa, who knows him better than he knows himself, will surely pick up on the fact that he's hiding something. He's more likely to hurt her by pretending that nothing has happened, if he makes her think that he doesn't trust her. He's seen this rom-com. Pretending that he hasn't seen this mysterious letter will only lead to disaster. 

But it doesn't feel right to just read it either. While the words seem to be directed at him, it's still her own writing, personal in its own right. 

He sighs, sticking his hand in his hair.

He looks at the closed drawer. He swallows. He's got a plan. He's just hoping it's the right one. 

-

He finds Tessa on her sofa in her living room, socked feet crossed and propped up on her ottoman. Her hair's gathered in a messy bun at the top of her head, glasses sliding down her nose, her laptop perched on her lap. She had mentioned she was working on sponsorship stuff. 

He pads quietly and softly towards her, his footfalls muffled by the carpet. 

She still senses him anyway. 

She smiles at him, soft but bright, like she's so happy to see him and he'd be lying if he said it didn't feel like cupid's arrow every time. The piercing burst of something in his chest, leaving him feeling both aching and wonderful. He just hadn't realised that was love for the longest time. 

But now he does. 

He's perfectly aware of the notepad he's holding, folded in half so that he can't see what's written on it. The apprehension must show on his face because she says his name with concern. "Scott?" 

"I've got a question to ask," he starts, sitting down beside her. 

She whips her head so fast her glasses become askew. "What do you mean?" She straightens them back up. 

"It's nothing bad, I promise!" he hastily adds. He cups the nape of her neck, his thumb rubbing back and forth just below her hairline. 

She leans into him a little. "Okay."

"So I was looking for my spare phone charger in one of your bedside drawers, but I found something else instead." He gives her the notepad, allowing it to open up to its flattened form in her hands. 

Her eyes widen, her posture stiffening, as she realises what he’s just given her.

"I promise I haven't read it!" he emphasises. "I just—I was wondering—” He takes a deep breath, trying to gather his wayward thoughts. “What’s this letter for, T?” he asks softly.

She’s sitting straight, still a little stiff. He places his hands on the outside of hers, his thumbs rubbing back and forth in what he hopes is a soothing motion. She’s got her gaze cast down. He can see her eyes running back and forth across the lines of her writing. He’s willing to wait as long as she needs him to. Honestly, he’ll make peace with the fact that this might be too personal for her to discuss right now, but he believes she trusts him enough to do so in the future.

"Did you know I had a plan?" 

"A plan for what?" 

"To fall out of love with you." She smooths out the folded piece of paper fully. "This letter was, like, step two. Of seven." 

It does make his heart stutter a little, even if the plan's obviously in the past. And it also seems like the most Tessa thing to do, to have a step-by-step guide to falling out of love. 

"Hey, T," he brushes the back of his fingers against her jaw, "I'm glad you didn't."

"It was supposed to be foolproof!" she bemoans. He laughs, because there’s a part of her that’s used to achieving every single one of her goals that’s clearly a little frustrated that she didn't succeed. "But, yeah, you're right. I'm glad it didn't work."

She leans into his side, her head on his shoulder. “You could have read it, you know,” she murmurs, so low he doesn’t quite catch it. “I did write it to you.” She rubs her thumb just below where she had written his name. She tilts her head to look up at him. “I would’ve understood if you did.”

“I know. It just...didn’t feel right to?” He tries to find the words to explain. “I want you to be able to trust that I trust you."

She closes her laptop, the lid giving a soft _ snick _ shut, and places it to her side. She moves her legs so that they lie across his lap. He catches them easily, his palms fitting to the curve of her legs, one of the many ways they’ve grown to fit together.

She offers the notepad to him. “Do you want to read it now?”

“Are you sure?” Until now, he still can’t believe all the parts of her that she gives him; a million mosaic pieces that make up the masterpiece that is her.

“Yeah.” She leans her head on his shoulder.

So he begins to read.

_ Dear Scott, _

_ I don’t know where to begin this letter, especially since I know you’re not going to read it _ — 

He has to smile a little at that. It’s a letter meant for him and yet not meant for him, at least when she first wrote it. He presses a kiss to the top of her head, letting himself linger.

—_ but I think I’m going to pretend that I’m actually writing to you because I feel like I’m going to find it easier. _

_ It’s probably easiest if I cut to the chase, yeah? I’m in love with you. _

Those last five words strung together in that order still knock the wind out of him. He has to pause, take a shaky breath. Tessa takes his free hand, the one not holding her letter, and slots their fingers together. Not in the exact alternating way that most couples do. No, they’re Tessa and Scott and the way they fit is as weirdly wonderful as their handholds, like ones with her pinky between his index and middle fingers.

_ I can’t say when I started Scott. I can’t pinpoint the exact moments when I knew I had fallen. I read this quote on Instagram once, it went something like, ‘Maybe falling in love with you is as natural as breathing. I did it completely subconsciously and once I noticed I was doing it, I realised I’d been doing it all along.’ _

He thinks he fell in love with her a little differently than how she did with him. If she fell in love with him like breathing, he fell in love with her like dancing. In steps. In complicated sequences, in the sense that there’ll only ever be one partner for him. Sometimes, the journey to realising it was like one step forward and two steps back. But now that he knows in whose arms he belongs, he wouldn't change it for the world. 

_ And that’s what it was like for me. It’s like one day I turned to you on the ice and both everything and nothing has changed. Everything changed because I’d realised my heart wasn’t mine anymore. It had become yours, whole and entire. Nothing changed because I wondered whether my heart was ever mine to begin with anyway. I think it might have been only ever been yours. _

“T,” his voice breaks on that one letter. He’s trying not to cry but it’s hard not to when you see the words etched into the crevices of your heart mirrored by the person your heart belongs to. "I think my heart has only ever been yours too."

_ I’m sorry, I guess. I’m sorry not because I love you, but because I realise now that there were times when how I felt towards you made me resent you for not returning it. _

It breaks him a little to read her resigned hopelessness that he could never return her feelings for him. He wonders if he should’ve done something earlier, confessed what he felt earlier, but he’s so grateful that they’re here now.

_ You’re my best friend, kiddo. We’ve both made mistakes but you’re the best partner that I could’ve asked for. You’re driven and passionate and dedicated. Kind and thoughtful and good. Funny and goofy and sweet. And you’ve stuck by me. _

A single compliment from Tessa is worth a million of anyone else’s. To read her list all the qualities that she sees in him makes him want to be the best man he could possibly be for her, to live up to what she believes he’s capable of being.

_ I’m never going to stop loving you. I’m just going to change the way in which I do. Since you’re never gonna read this, I’ll admit I’ve had dreams where I’m in a wedding dress walking down an aisle toward you and you look so happy to see me and oh god I’m tearing up. Shit. I’ll always dream of being beside you for the rest of my life, but I guess how the dream looks like just needs to change. _

“Tessa,” he breathes. He notices that her cheeks are a light pink. He’s been keeping track of where he’s up to in the letter with his thumb marking each line. He knows she knows where he’s up to.

“It’s the truth,” she answers simply, the tip of her index finger running under the line ‘_I’ve had dreams where I’m in a wedding dress walking down an aisle toward you and you look so happy to see me’_. 

He’s overcome by a mix of love and joy and disbelief, and he knows he’s starting to tear up. He can’t find the right words to say to her, so he lets go of the letter momentarily and kisses her instead. It’s the best kind of kiss where she can feel her smiling against his lips.

_ Maybe we are eighty-something-year-olds and watching Jeopardy together, but your wife will be there with us as well, y’know? Maybe I’ll be married too, some other guy, but since my heart’s still currently and inconveniently yours, it’s hard to picture that future. I want to know I’ll always have you in my life, Scott. I want you to know I’m gonna try my damn hardest to always stay in yours. I hope you don’t mind. _

He can’t help the jealous stab in his chest when he reads her musings on possibly being married to someone else. She laughs and rubs the corner of his jaw, where he realises he’s clenching. Oh right, his jealous tick.

She kisses that spot. “You know you don’t need to be jealous, right? I’m currently and _still_ inconveniently yours.” Her tone's teasing and he laughs, bringing their joined hands to his lips. 

He’s completely and utterly hers and he wouldn’t have it any other way.

_ This letter is meant to be the second step in me falling out of love with you. _

_ You know me. This is just another goal I’m working towards. I know I’m gonna achieve it. I wasn’t a three-time Olympic Gold medallist for nothing. _

“I know you achieve practically all your goals but I’m really, really, _ really _ glad your plan didn’t work out,” he teases.

“Shut up,” she rolls her eyes, but he knows she’s trying to stop herself from grinning. “You make it hard to stop loving you, you know that?”

He’s smiling stupidly at that. She makes it impossible for him to stop loving her too. Not that he has any desire to.

_ It might take some time Scott. But I’m gonna do it. For you. _

She would have done it for him. Because that’s Tessa, selfless and sacrificial to a fault. He finds himself rereading the letter again, because these words meant for him, even if it’s a past version of him, are to be treasured.

“Thank you. For letting me read this,” he looks into her eyes as he says the words.

She shrugs one shoulder and snuggles further into his side. “There’s not a part of me I’m not willing to show you.” 

They haven’t let go of each other’s hands.

-

He wakes up in the middle of that night with the idea and the urge to do it.

Tessa’s sleeping beside him and he’s careful to make sure not to wake her when he gets up. She’s still a restless sleeper but he’s lucky this time that she only stirs slightly, moving towards the spot he’s just vacated as if searching for him. It makes him want to just get back in bed, but this idea has grabbed ahold of him and it shouldn’t take too long.

He wanders into the kitchen, turning the light on. It’s far enough from her bedroom that it shouldn’t wake her up. He had picked up the notepad from where they’d left it behind on the couch and grabbed a stray pen from the kitchen counter. He turns the first page carefully, tearing out the blank one after it.

He’s not the most prolific of writers (although he’s quite proud he knows the word ‘prolific’) and Tessa probably deserves something more poetic than what he’ll ever be able to write but—she’s chosen him. All he can give her is himself, whole and flawed and entire.

He was worried that he might struggle to find the right words to say. He knows what he feels, knows how much love he holds in his heart for her, but he wasn’t sure he’d be able to translate what he feels into words on paper.

He finds that that’s not the case. The moment he starts writing, the words just...flow. He needs to write as fast as he can to catch up with the words that that his brain supplies. He fills the page full by the time he gets to the end and there’s more that he can say but that’s alright.

This can be his first of a lifetime of love letters.

–

He leaves the letter folded in half, a simple ‘-T’ written on the front of the folded page, on his pillow for her to find when she wakes up. He kisses her forehead as he gets up, smoothing back wayward strands of hair.

He’s started on omelettes for breakfast when he hears the quick patter of footsteps down the hallway. He turns to see Tessa holding his letter in one hand, a little crumpled from how tightly she’s holding onto it. She’s wiping her eyes with the back of her other hand and the realisation that Tessa’s crying sends him to her as quickly as he can manage, half-beaten eggs forgotten on the kitchen counter.

“Scott,” she sobs in his arms, but she’s smiling so wide that the sound turns into a laugh in the next moment. Her laugh-cry: his favourite sound.

She buries his face in his neck. “It’s beautiful.” Her voice is muffled and he feels the dampness of her tears on his skin. She pulls back and his hands cradle her cheeks, his thumbs sweeping away her tears. “I love you.”

He whispers her words back, and he knows any letter they’ll write each other, no matter how long or short, will always be just a hundred different versions of those three simple words.

**Author's Note:**

> as always, you can find me as [stardust_echoes](https://twitter.com/stardust_echoes) on twitter and as [echoesofstardust](https://echoesofstardust.tumblr.com/) on tumblr
> 
> wishing you a lovely day! <3


End file.
